Wyoming Becomes First State to Outright Ban Abortion Pills

Wyoming became the first state to ban using pills for abortions after the republican Governor of Wyoming, Mark Gordon, signed a bill Friday, March 17, according to the New York Times. 

Gordon was quoted in a letter released by Wyoming’s secretary of state saying, “I have a strong record of protecting the lives of the unborn, as well as their mothers. I believe all life is sacred and that every individual, including the unborn, should be treated with dignity and compassion…I have acted without bias and after extensive prayer, to allow these bills to become law.”

According to Vanity Fair, the law will take effect in July, and carries up to six months imprisonment, up to $9,000 in fines, and includes the use of medications to treat “natural miscarriage.” 

ABC news stated that the ban would allow abortions for cases of rape and incest, to save a woman’s life, or prevent harm to her health. 

International Criminal Court Issues Arrest Warrant for Vladimir Putin

The International Criminal Court (ICC) has issued an arrest warrant for Russian President Vladimir Putin, citing his alleged involvement in the abduction of Ukrainian Children. An additional warrant was made for the arrest of Russia’s Commissioner for Children’s Rights, Maria Alekseyevna Lvova-Belova.

The ICC’s stated purpose is to investigate and, where warranted, try individuals charged with the gravest crimes of concern to the international community: genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity and the crime of aggression. Russian abductions of Ukrainian children from their families has been consistently denounced among Western audience – with the most vocal of these voices being unafraid to decry the whole affair as part of a larger genocide and ethnic cleansing of the Ukrainian national identity.

Regardless, this arrest warrant for Vladimir Putin is the most high profile arrest that the ICC has attempted to facilitate, and the response from the international community is not universally positive. In Russia, the former president and Putin’s closest ally, Dmitry Medvedev, wrote on his Telegram page against the decision: “It is quite possible to imagine the targeted use of a hypersonic missile from the North Sea from a Russian ship at the Hague courthouse.”

The Russians have shown a complete disrespect for the decision, and it remains to be seen if most countries will actually follow through and make the arrest against Putin if he were to visit their country.

Liquidity Crisis Hits Several Major Western Banks, Stoking Fears of Economic Crash

Silicon Valley Bank collapsed last Friday, making it the second-largest bank failure in US History. In New York, Signature Bank narrowly avoided a similar fate through a buyout by New York Community Bank. In Switzerland Credit Suisse, their second-largest bank, had to be bought out by their rival and first-largest, UBS, in a historic deal to save the whole banking system of the country and secure billions in international deposits. 186 other banks in the US are in a similar crisis – a liquidity crisis.

Liquidity is the availability of liquid assets – or actual cash funds. When banks don’t have availability to these funds, that becomes a problem, for them and for the depositors. 

When most people work with Banks, it’s to keep their money secure and growing at a steady rate of interest without the frantic work of the stock market. Likewise, being able to withdraw as much cash as you need at any time is a necessity, but the banks could never realistically provide a physical cash amount if hundreds went to withdraw at the same time – in a ‘bank run.’

Banks deal with more than just regular withdrawals by their customers; they must add to their customers’ accounts as interest, they must pay their employees and maintain their physical locations. In addition, these banks need to serve as lenders of hundreds (if not thousands) of loans.

That is to say, that banks need sources of income just like anybody else, and they would do this through investment in the market, but also more secure investments – like Government Bonds. But through mismanagement, inefficiency, and rising interest rates (meaning more of an expenditure for these banks) they cannot find enough of an income to create a sizable pool to be withdrawn from. Though the situation has stabilized these days, helped by the speedy actions by market forces, there is an underlying fear among many Americans that the whole financial system is vulnerable to massive failure.